Debunking Those Big Fat Lies

Uncover the Secrets to How You Can Eat Fat, Lose Weight

Sounds counter-intuitive, doesn’t it?

But the truth is that eating the right kind of fat is one of the keys to effortless weight loss.

Here is a sneak preview of my revised and updated book, Eat Fat Lose Weight: How Smart Fats Reset Metabolism, Stress, Hunger and Sex Hormones for lasting weight loss and radiant health. The Kindle version launches December 1, 2015, but it’s available NOW for pre-order!

Let’s be honest. Fat is back big time!

Even Time magazine is in on the newly found love affair with fats. “Eat Butter” is prominently declared on the cover of the June 2014 issue with its larger than life delicious golden butter gracing the entire page!

And it’s about time. For over half a century, fat has been terribly maligned and misunderstood in the American diet landscape and our health and expanding waistlines have suffered for it.

While “fat makes you fat” has been the mantra of most diet gurus over the last 20 years, NOTHING could be further from the truth. The right Smart Fats are the #1 secret to fixing your metabolism, stress, hunger and sex hormones for lasting weight loss, vitality and overall wellbeing.

Big Fat Fears

The American public has been brainwashed with a big fat lie—a lie that has been told, retold and told again for well over 50 years. What’s more, this lie has been extended to cover all fats, not just the hydrogenated, overly refined and genetically modified commercial vegetable oils that actually will harm you.

Truth be told, our fear of fats only began in the 1950s thanks to the work of research scientist Ancel Keys, PhD, who conducted the Seven Countries Study in which he cherry picked data to support his theory that fat consumption led to cardiovascular disease. Although considered “pioneering” back in the day, the study was deeply flawed. Yet, the media ran with it and by 1961 even the American Heart Association issued its first anti-fat guidelines. This resulted in the launching of the no-to-low fat diet dictum that—to this very day—many health experts still recommend and rely upon as gospel.

As I wrote in the first edition of Eat Fat Lose Weight, since we as a nation have gone fat-free, we have gotten sicker. Here’s what happened:

65% of the population are now obese.

Adult-onset diabetes has skyrocketed and more than tripled in the last 30 years.

The incidence of certain kinds of heart disease has increased.

Depression has become a widespread epidemic.

New health problems have appeared out of nowhere: mysterious low grade ailments such as chronic fatigue, widespread food and environmental sensitivities, leaky gut syndrome, yeast and mold infections, and autoimmune issues.

Thankfully, many other courageous researchers (spearheaded in part by my late friend and colleague, Dr. Robert Atkins) began rethinking the anti-fat dietary guidelines and provided ample evidence and science that the “right” high fat diet was actually healthy and that sugar was the underlying cause for most degenerative disease.

Fat Phobia

It’s a message I have been preaching for a very long time. When Eat Fat Lose Weight first came out 15 years ago, it was absolute heresy in the age of fat phobia. Before it became mainstream, I was the ONLY nutritionist in the country to write about the importance of the right dietary fats—a very unpopular message which flew in the face of all conventional dietary wisdom of the 1980s.

The time has finally come to set the record straight with a newer, updated edition that is more streamlined for today’s audience, thanks to the results from the latest trials which have exonerated fats once and for all. These trials have shown that not only was a high fat diet more effective for weight loss, but also greatly reduced the risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Yes, the science now proves it. A high fat diet is a healthier diet.

I know that many of you have already banned transfats and margarine. You try to avoid refined polyunsaturated vegetable oils like corn and canola. However, before you start slathering on all that butter or coconut oil, and bringin’ home the bacon, it is important to understand that eating all those good fats—what I call the “Smart Fats”—is simply one part of a healthy weight loss equation. You must also learn the keys to making Smart Fats work for you. I will tell you the very best fats to eat and the trick to activating them to burn as your body’s MOST efficient fuel.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could eat all the healthy fats you wanted, properly utilize them and look and feel fabulous in your body? You can!

What Eat Fat, Lose Weight Can Do For You

My newest book is your road map back to the Smart Fats that will keep you thin for life with beautiful glowing skin, healthy hair and nails, energy through the roof, a positive attitude and no more sugar cravings!

Some Smart Fats can fix metabolism while others help you deal with stress and rebalance sex hormones. They also singlehandedly boost nutrient absorption and reduce inflammation which is linked to a whole host of conditions you want to avoid—like heart disease, depression, diabetes, arthritis, psoriasis, eczema and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

You will learn all the tasty tricks to adding Smart Fats into your daily food intake—how to use them in your smoothies, salads, sides, soups and sauces. I’ll even share some ideas for easy desserts with all the Smart Fat trimmings—as well as suggestions for Smart Sips, Smart Seasonings and Smart Supplements.

You will uncover all the very best foods and nutrients that help you digest and assimilate the Smart Fats so your body can efficiently utilize them as the perfect food for maximum weight loss and stress control.

Right now, fats are hot! Look everywhere. Everyone is confirming what I wrote about over 25 years ago—add MORE, not less fat to your diet.

But, there is a lot more to it. If you can’t break down the fats properly or if you have too many pollutants already in your body (as we all do), you will end up in worse shape than when you started. As a matter of fat, simply adding more into your diet, even Smart Fats, isn’t going to get you to your goal if your body cannot digest them.

And it all boils down to bile.

Bile: Your New BFF

Bile is an emulsifier—a type of soap for fats. It breaks down the fats into small particles so that your intestines can absorb them. Produced by the liver to the tune of about one quart per day, bile is made from lecithin, cholesterol and bilirubin. It is stored near the liver in the gallbladder. From there, it is transported to the intestines during digestion.

Here’s a NEWSFLASH for you: Bile is not ONLY the real key to the body’s ability to digest and assimilate fats, but it is also a vehicle for removing toxins from your body so they can be flushed out through the colon.

Bile is one of the liver’s premier detox mechanisms so the consequences of inadequate bile go far beyond the inability to lose weight. If the liver can’t clear fats, then it most likely can’t break down hormones or other metabolic waste products either, and you can end up with hot flashes, night sweats, cysts, migraines and depression.

To put it another way, bile is one of the most underrated and ignored methods our bodies utilize to move out toxins. The quantity of bile your body makes is directly proportional to the quantity of toxins you can eliminate.

If you lack enough fiber to escort these toxins out of your body, they can remain (along with bile) in your intestines for too long and are then reabsorbed. This is when toxic overload occurs with poisonous wastes ending up stagnant in your lymphatics and getting stuck in the bloodstream, joints and other tissues.

There is already a 75% bile deficiency by the time allergies, arthritis, and inflammation in joints and muscles develop. By the time cancer or chronic illness is diagnosed, a whopping 90% deficit has already occurred.

If your gallbladder hasn’t been doing its job due to a lack of the right Smart Fats or too much hydrogenated fat or even if your gallbladder is gone, your body loses its ability to adequately regulate proper bile flow. Without your gallbladder, for instance, there is still a steady release of bile from the liver, but it is “mismatched” with the amount of oil or fat you are consuming—whether in quantity or timing. This has a cascading detrimental effect on your digestion as well as absorption of the fat-soluble vitamins (A, E, D, and K) and the essential fatty acids you will read about later.

Moreover, bile can be hampered from doing its job because of a lack of bile nutrients, congestion or even clogged bile ducts which interfere with bile flow and result in less bile production.

Regardless of where the bile is—in the liver, in the gallbladder or in the bile ducts—the principles of manufacturing, thinning and moving bile are the same.

Bile helps to break down ALL dietary fats and ALL fat-soluble vitamins. This is no insignificant task. If you check any decent nutritional textbook these days and research all the symptoms and problems linked with fat-soluble vitamin deficiencies you will find everything from dry skin to indigestion to cataracts and cancer. Bile also acts as a lubricant for your stool to prevent constipation. Who knew?

Just as fascinating, French researchers have found that bile may be connected to our obesity epidemic and hypothyroidism. They discovered that fat metabolism is sped up by the activation of thyroid hormones in the fat cells. Could it be that an imbalance of bile is one of the reasons that hypothyroidism is so rampant today?

The Allergy Connection

If you are experiencing frequent gallbladder attacks OR if you have had your gallbladder taken out, but still experience pain, you should definitely know about the work of allergist Dr. James C. Brenemen. In this research in the 1960s and ‘70s, he made the surprising discovery that gallbladder pain was significantly related to food allergies! When his study participants eliminated their food allergies—eggs, pork, onions, chicken and turkey, milk, coffee and oranges were the biggest offenders—they obtained 100% relief! Wow!

The Stomach Acid Connection

You should also take a more up-close and personal evaluation of your stomach acid—meaning, your hydrochloric acid (HCl) production, or lack there-of. Low HCl levels—as a result of aging, stess, or a lack of HCl producing nutrients—can contribute to a dysfunctional gallbladder. When you’re not secreting enough HCl, the opening to the small intestine can become spastic. This keeps bile from entering the small intestine, so it backs up into the liver and gallbladder. Meanwhile your poor pancreas, which regulates release of insulin, also suffers from the lack of HCl and bile.

Bile: The Forgotten Key

Without proper fat absorption, many things can happen in a cascade of unwelcomed side effects. You will be deficient in utilizing B vitamins for digestion, nerve health, energy and mental well-being. You will be unable to regulate calcium levels in the bloodstream and transport it to the tissues for strong bones and cramp-free muscles. You won’t be able to carry and store fat-soluble vitamins such as A, D, E and K for healthy skin, reproduction and blood clotting. You will be unable to conserve protein to rebuild vital tissues, maintain a normal body temperature, insulate and cushion your vital organs, nerves, and muscles against shock, heat and cold, or seal in moisture for healthier skin, hair and nails.

And that’s STILL not all that happens without proper fat utilization.

As the years go by, you can start to experience chronic dry and itchy skin, digestive upsets, a higher likelihood of constipation and irritability, nervousness and even anxiety.

Convinced? I certainly hope so. These Smart Fats we all so desperately need can boost every aspect of health—especially your brain to encourage clear and calm thinking and focus. The brain is made of 60% fat. If your body is NOT receiving, digesting or assimilating high quality Smart Fats, your cells will be woefully lacking the raw materials they need for high quality brain function.

Your Body’s SOS Signals

What are some of the screaming signs that your body is not properly digesting fats?

Queasiness after a fatty meal (impaired bile flow)

Light colored or floating stools (lack of bile output)

Nausea (not enough bile)

Dry skin and hair (lack of essential fatty acids)

Constipation (inadequate bile for lubrication)

Constant feeling of fullness

Inability to lose weight

Pain under the right rib cage (reflective pain from gallbladder)

Hemorrhoids (congested liver)

Varicose veins (pressure from constipation due to thickened bile)

Pain between the shoulder blades (reflective pain from gallbladder)

Bloating or gas

Headache over the eyes (gallbladder meridian passes over this region)

Bitter taste in mouth, after meals (sign of bile regurgitation)

History of prescription or recreational drug use (need for more liver and gallbladder support)

Also, keep in mind that if you have been following a low-fat or non-fat diet for a while, your gallbladder has been on vacation. It will need some time to adjust to actually working again the way Mother Nature intended when adding back the Smart Fats. Simply put, the gallbladder is an organ that requires you use it or else you will lose it (quite literally in this case).

Sadly, over the last several decades so many of us have been brainwashed to trade in our “bad” saturated butter for processed margarine or polyunsaturated vegetable oils. The truth is that low-fat diets or diets filled with these hydrogenated or transfats do not stimulate the gallbladder to release bile properly as only the Smart Fats can.

Get a Smart Start

It’s time to wipe the slate clean because in Eat Fat Lose Weightyou will be introduced to the various Smart Fats and learn how they function and help you to reprogram your fat cells to slim, once again!

If you’re going to be adding more Smart Fats to your diet—one to two tablespoons of coconut oil, a couple of pats of butter, a tablespoon of cream—then by all means, do make sure you’re digesting them properly.

Liver & Gallbladder Tune-Up Tricks

In the meantime, try some of my personal liver and gallbladder tune-up tricks to set the stage for the most efficient Smart Fat utilization that will help you lose weight by also balancing your metabolism, stress, appetite and sex hormones.

1. Remember, bile is beautiful! For those of you without a gallbladder, with gallstones, or who are exhibiting signs of poor fat metabolism, a bile extract (known as bile salts) like Beta Plus would be my choice to provide the missing bile to help emulsify fats. There are several bile supplements available on the market today. An ox bile supplement is considered a daily “must” for those of you who have had your gallbladder removed. You may also have to supplement with other gallbladder support as well. One product does not work for every body, so see what works for you and slowly but surely build up tolerance.

2. Beets can’t be beat. Beets thin out and move bile. Beets are chock full of betaine which is a supercharged bile rebuilder. These can be roasted, steamed or taken as beet root powder. Beets can also be grated raw in salads or juiced in a combo along with carrot, celery and cucumber juice. Beet root concentrate can also be taken in a tablet form, I like Beta TCP.

3. Add some artichokes. Artichokes are a wonderful bile-producing food and also support overall liver function. I recommend Liver-Lovin Formula.

4. Load up on lecithin. Lecithin, from non-GMO soy or sunflower seeds, is one of the primary emulsifying or detergent-like agents in bile. It breaks down fats and makes them easy to digest. It also keeps cholesterol moving through the bloodstream and prevents blockage.

5. Opt for orthophosphoric acid. This liquid substance is a natural remedy to help dissolve gallstones and remove blockages, providing relief from discomfort.

6. Drink hot water with lemon first thing in the morning. This daily Fat Flush ritual helps thin bile to get it moving. It is also a great way to gently cleanse your liver and detoxify your system.

7. Enjoy apple cider vinegar. A miracle in a bottle that cures all sorts of woes, apple cider vinegar contains malic acid, which aids in digestion and thins out bile.

8. Consider HCl supplementation. Start at moderate doses as low as 250 mg per capsule and work your way up according to tolerance. HCl is best combined with pepsin, another stomach digestive aid and sometimes is formulated with ox bile for more complete digestion.

9. Look for lipase. For most efficient absorption and assimilation of Smart Fats, you might consider adding lipase. This is a digestive enzyme secreted by the pancreas, which breaks down fats and oils into small particles. In my testing, lipase is one of the most highly deficient enzymes for just about everybody.

10. Try taurine. This is a very important amino acid commonly deficient in those with allergies and multiple environmental sensitivities. It is required by the liver for the removal of toxic chemicals, drugs and metabolites from the body. It is a key component of bile acids made in the liver. It is commonly deficient in vegetarians because it derived from organ meats and other animal proteins.

11. Get clear about choline. While typically used for cognitive improvement and muscular endurance, this vitamin is key for regenerating the part of your liver that makes bile. Choline functions as a powerful emulsifying agent making fats easier to digest. And, it is a most outstanding nutrient to remedy a fatty liver.

When it comes to weight loss, there are no quick fixes but Eat Fat Lose Weight comes close. I have searched way beyond the conventional answers to uncover the root causes of unexplained weight gain. Hopefully my investigative nature will pay off huge healthy dividends. Many years of hands-on experience and avidly following the latest research studies and diet trends, led me to the insights I will be sharing with you in this book. Won’t you join me?

Oh Ann Louise, I am really looking forward to reading your new book! I’m so glad that it’s available on Kindle in time for the holidays because I DON’T want to gain weight and I DO want to get healthy. Just reading the front cover gives me hope! Can’t wait!!

This is great, Ann Louise! Can’t wait for your hardcover book on this to come out—I have your first edition from 15 years ago—looking forward to reading your current research regarding the healthy and essential fats–one of the very important keys to good health…. The info on bile is a revelation…Thank you so much for your new and updated “Eat Fat, Lose Weight” book!!

[…] This is the time of New Year’s Resolutions – to eat better and to exercise regularly. So, I’m here to help and make it simple. This month’s newsletter looks at some gems from the past – the best foods to eat and the best way to exercise and the best book on nutrition! The Best Book on Nutrition She’s been telling us to eat fat for over 20 years. Always ahead of her times, Ann Louise Gittleman has revised and updated her book Eat Fat, Lose Weight. This was the first book of its kind when it came out. I encourage you to read it. For a nice overview of the book, click here: http://annlouise.com/2015/11/20/debunking-those-big-fat-lies/ […]

Dera Dr.AG I just bought your Bile Builder, I had my gallbladder taken out 7 years ago and came down with Gastroparesis.It started with low thyroid, weight gain, fibromyalgia, estrogen dominance, major constipation, fatigue, anxiety, sleeplessness, and hard to digest, fat.But when it turned into major Gastroparesis and eventually bad pain in the liver, gallbladder area cramps in the stomach until its hard to breathe and pale stools and parasites.After many years of research and no help from the doctors, I now am gluten free, vegan, Non-GMO, take bio-I progesterone and your product Bile Builder, just started yesterday.I do many, many other things to help myself like I have done 3 liver flushes, and wow what came out was unreal.I will continue.I have lost EVERYTHING from this condition but hope your product gives me the push I need, I think THIS is why so many mostly women are getting GP. I hope Bile Builder works.Please pray for me, and thank Dr. for helping us. Ava

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About Ann Louise

Columbia-educated nutritionist, visionary health expert and bestselling author, Ann Louise Gittleman, has always been a trendsetter in functional and integrative medicine. Continually breaking new ground in traditional and holistic health, she is internationally recognized as a pioneer in dietary, environmental, and women's health issues and is known as "The First Lady of Nutrition" among her millions of followers worldwide.